Republican superPACS buying the election…nah, look for the union label

Just got an email from friend, Barack. Horrors, sound the alarm, he’s being outraised:

We’re getting outraised — a first for a sitting president, if this continues. Not just by the super PACs and outside groups that are pouring hundreds of millions of dollars into misleading ads, but by our opponent and the Republican Party, which just outraised us for the second month in a row.

This election will be a test of the model that got us here. We’ll learn whether it’s still true that a grassroots campaign can elect a president — whether ordinary Americans are in control of our democracy in the face of massive spending.

Now, this is rich. About as rich as the Wall Street hedge funds, Hollywood millionaires and, lately the New York fashionistas spending $40k/plate to re-elect him. But even better, how about Barack’s union buddy, Richard Trumka, AFL-CIO chieftain. You know him, he’s the one who visited the White House four dozen times according to the WH visitor logs.

AFL-CIO head Richard Trumka has been logged in at least four dozen times, often with other labor bigwigs, but the records tell why he was there in only 12 of those cases, and those are mostly ceremonial events or busy social functions. Twice last year, Trumka met privately with Obama and once with Vice President Joseph Biden, the records show, but no details are in the logs. The AFL-CIO had no comment.

The usual measure of unions’ clout encompasses chiefly what they spend supporting federal candidates through their political-action committees, which are funded with voluntary contributions, and lobbying Washington, which is a cost borne by the unions’ own coffers. These kinds of spending, which unions report to the Federal Election Commission and to Congress, totaled $1.1 billion from 2005 through 2011, according to the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics.

The unions’ reports to the Labor Department capture an additional $3.3 billion that unions spent over the same period on political activity.

So, if I do the math, that’s $4.4 billion spent in six years or approximately $733 million annually.

Mr. President, considering that your campaign in 2008 decided to forego federal matching funds, and out-raised and out-spent the John McCain by about 5:1, now that the proverbial shoe is on the other foot in 2012, you’re crying foul.

Donations not pouring in? Ask both Davids and then go look for the union label.